History of religion – sacrifice, holidays
Building at Gobekli Tepe (ca. 9000 BC) People have started a lot of different religions. Some of them are still practiced today; others are not. It is hard even to [...]
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The end of animal sacrifice – History of religion
Sacrificial procession (Pitsa, ca. 530 BC) People probably began to do animal sacrifice around the time they began farming and keeping domesticated animals, about 10,000 BC. They were certainly sacrificing animals to their gods all over Europe and Asia [...]
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Christian vocabulary – what do the words mean?
Priest blessing people who have the plague As Christianity developed into a world religion, it also developed a lot of special words. These Christian words describe the different people involved. [...]
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Bible verses – Christianity – Religion
Gutenberg Bible When people want to tell you where to find certain words in the Christian Bible, they write something like Matthew 10:25, or Exodus 12:1. This means look in the book [...]
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What is the Trinity? Christianity – Religion
Father, Son, and Holy Ghost (Perugino, about 1482 in Rome) Christian people all believed that there was one God. But many people thought God existed in three forms: God the Father, Jesus the [...]
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What is tonsure? Medieval Christianity
Young tonsured monks at school Tonsure means to cut off someone's hair. Monks and nuns in the Middle Ages generally showed that they were monks by cutting their hair short (when most [...]
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Christian saints – History of Christianity
St. Francis of Assisi, painted by Giotto in the early 1300s AD From early on, Christians believed that some holy people, when they died, not only went to heaven but [...]
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What is purgatory? History of Christianity
A demon torturing a sinful bishop and a king (Notre Dame Cathedral, Paris, 1200s AD) In the early days of Christianity, people pretty much thought that at the Last Judgment you [...]
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What is a Christian priest? History of Religion
Priest blessing people who have the plague Very soon after the crucifixion of Jesus, by around 40 or 50 AD, the early Christians began to choose leaders from among themselves. The Christians called these [...]
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What does it mean to be Pope? History of Christianity
Peter and Paul, in a mosaic from Ravenna (500s AD) In the later Roman Empire and the Middle Ages, the Pope was the leader of the Catholic Church. Whenever there was a question [...]
